I don't know why I have to feel like I need to be pleasant when I am so frustrated with the lack of response. Here's the story. My last surgery was not good. I had a time limit given which seemed odd, the surgeon didn't tell me anything about my condition, and he didn't even show me images of the MRI or anything. He left me confused but at least I could walk again. Fast forward to now. I can feel the tumor growing back. I still don't know if I had localized or diffused or both. The surgeon never bothered to tell me. We agreed he doesn't need to do the next surgery. Neither of us are interested in working together. I started shopping for other surgeons.
Along the way, my family doctor who has to orchestrate the referral process retired. I got a new doctor a few months ago and filled him in on my plan to find another surgeon. We searched Google and found one that might be able to perform the surgery I need. I got a referral in the mail but it was for the first surgeon who performed the first surgery. I called the doctors office and asked for the correct referral. I got one for a doctor that is 40 miles away and it was not the doctor we found on Google. I called the doctors office back to ask why I still haven't received a referral for the surgeon that my new doctor found on Google. I left a message. I left another message a few days later. Finally I went to the clinic because nobody was returning my calls.
The doctors office informed me that they were limited to their "in network" surgeons and that I would need to exhaust all options before I could get a referral to an "out of network" surgeon. They have 33 surgeons in their network. Most of who are over 30 miles away from my home. The clinic explained that I would need to call the insurance company to get an approval from them to go outside of the network. So I called and the one person I need to speak to was out of the office for a few days. I asked to leave a message for her to call me back. A week passed and no call was returned. Not sure why it's so difficult for people to return calls. I called again today and left yet another message. Won't be able to go to their office to demand service so now I'm stuck waiting more. Meanwhile I'm having issues walking and eventually will need to have another surgery. Hopefully sooner than later. But with waiting for people to call me back, it seems to be later than I would like.
